Has anyone seen my misplaced modifier?

Rob Kyff

Published Friday, October 27, 2000

It was no easy task to shoot a deer on crutches." Oh dear. When I first read that sentence (spotted by Betty Sodders of Sault Ste. Marie, Mich.), I pictured poor doomed Bambi hobbling through the woods.

Then I realized the hunter, not the hunted, was on crutches.

That's a classic example of a misplaced modifier -- a word or phrase located next to the wrong noun or pronoun. A misplaced modifier is like an antler growing out of a stag's back -- and sometimes it looks even stranger.

What's worse, it can cause confusion. Consider this sentence sent to me by Alan Clem of Vermillion, S.D.: "Police said entrance was gained through a rear screen window to a porch which was cut and removed." I've heard of napping on porches, but never porch-napping!

If you've been feeling subhuman lately, you'll be more human by early next year -- so says this sentence spotted by Gordon Higinbotham of Farmington, Conn.: "Researchers are racing to complete a 'working draft' of the genetic code that makes us human beings by early next year."

Some misplaced modifiers can literally backfire. Consider this photo caption spotted by M. A. Lester of Campbell, Calif.: "Volunteers demonstrate how a cannon was fired at the Museum of the Civil War Soldier near Richmond, Va." Or this passage, spotted by Allene Cockcroft of San Jose, Calif., about a wharf fire: "Divers continued to search for the cause of the blaze on the ocean floor."

Betty Lundy of West Point, Miss., wondered whether concrete or coffee caused the injuries in this calamity: "The concrete roof of a covered walkway collapsed Sunday as churchgoers socialized between services and ate doughnuts and drank coffee, injuring 23 people."

And then there's this revealing sentence, spotted by Jim Dexter of Collinsville, Conn.: "He pleaded guilty to two counts of indecent exposure in Bantam Superior Court." Let's hope justice was blind!

Location, location, location! Make sure those modifiers are snug and comfy cozy with the words they describe. One misplaced antler can be staggering.